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Monday, January 21, 2013

One Dark Review

When a controversial event happens, there has to be a film about it. It's the case with Zero Dark Thirty, a movie about the manhunt for UBL starring Jessica Chastain and directed by Kathryn Bigelow. There were two thrilers happening in Arabia that were nominated for Best Picture this year (Argo and this) and this is in my opinion my favorite. This movie is challenging to make because everybody knows what will happen at the end in a way so the intensity should be low but Kathryn's great direction made it work.

Zero Dark Thirty is taking place from 2001 to 2011 so during ten years. The movie pulled it off pretty well thought. Anyways this CIA agent called Maya is working on UBL and is trying to find him. Her character is well developed and her performance was really good. Again, she pulled it off pretty well. The other characters in the movie though... didn't show up a lot so you don't care as much for them than Maya. For instance, Maya is a bit of a loner and tries to overcome it and has this friend/college she hangs out with. Then something happens to her friend and she's really sad and wants revenge from UBL. So, pretty much, you care about Maya instead of her friend. (mostly because her friend did something stupid to have something bad happen to her). There was still good characters like Dan (Jason Clarke) who is sick of doing his painful torture job at the CIA. But again, no character development to the navy seals. At least no one there died because it would have been a bad death cliche like when Agent Coulson died in "The Avengers".
The movie is nominated for Best Screenplay and don't get me wrong, it's not bad, but half of the words used are F*** or S***. The screenplay without the bad words is great and get's some realism into the movie but the swear words break it, it's fine to put swear words between friends but not to your boss! Here is the conversation Maya to her new boss "Hello" "Hello" "What do you think about Pakistan" "Pretty F***** up"
- What happened : "Didn't you sign up for this?" "No"
- What should have happened: "You're fired"
And they keep on swearing in business meetings to people that are superior to them! This is the CIA, do they swear that much??? That just made me not want to let that screenplay win the Oscar.The screenplay still put some humor and good dialogue but I just hatted the amount of swearing.
Now the supporting characters and the swearing in the movie is nothing compared to the great thing in this film. When the navy seals were getting their helicopters ready and flying off to the compound, that was really intense like you've been waiting this moment all this time. Once they get in, it's not as suspenseful but it still looks real and it was well executed. There were still things I didn't expect. Else, what happens before is still intense and interesting. Every now and then there is a terrorist attack whether it's in a hotel, in London or a failed attempt in Times Square which puts more suspense in the environment and keeps your "need to kill UBL" in your mind. The movie was very interesting and I learned things from it without it being a history lesson.

With a great screenplay (without swears) and great performances (not the supporting characters this is easily one of the best thrillers of the year. Kathryn Bigelow has done a great job reminding us The Hurt Locker was not luck but her skills.This is Jessica Chastain's chance to win Best Actress and she's going up against Jennifer Lawrence. This will be a tight match. Overall I just have to give this movie aA-. This movie will surely be on my top ten list of the year which will be my next post but for now, don't forget to like, and give this article a +1 if you liked it. What did you think of this movie? Did you prefer Argo? Don't forget to comment! See you soon.

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What is Film Arts?

Film Arts is a Blog about everything that has to do with films. There could be articles about anything, from Little films to big movies, and from movie lists to reviews. I will post articles, or anything related to movies, whenever I find something interesting to tell. In this Blog, I will be posting movie reviews, information on film awards, movie lists and also just plain articles about films. I will not have time to review EVERY movie coming out in theaters, but I will review the ones I see.